The Sunday Business Post

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May 24, 2015 Price €2.90
‘Even the sun came out to shine’
Pat Leahy We think
of elections and
referendums as
changing things. In
fact, they are often
only the evidence of
changes that have
already taken place
The referendum on samesex marriage isn’t the biggest change; though it is,
of course, a monumental
milestone in the lives of gay
Irishmen and Irishwomen.
The biggest change is the
revolution in social attitudes
to gay people.
The mass invasion of polling centres by young people
on Friday was a spectacle
of democracy in its own
right. More significant were
the grannies and grandads
shuffling in to vote for perhaps the most radical social
change ever put before the
Irish people.
They are the people who
have changed, and their
change has been breathtaking in its speed and its scope.
That change is one of the
big reasons behind yesterday’s result. The other is
politics. The campaign for
marriage equality was one
of the most effective political and lobbying campaigns
that Ireland has ever seen.
The referendum campaign of recent months was
only the last phase of a long
march to equality for gay
people; but it was the most
spectacular. The campaign
was single-minded, colourful, ruthlessly disciplined
with itself, overwhelmingly
personal and positive.
The Yes campaign had
big allies – the government,
the media, big business. But
its signal moments were
personal stories: Leo Varadkar, Ireland’s first openly
gay cabinet minister, brave
in a way that none of his
predecessors have had to
be; Ursula Halligan’s almost
painful, plaintive honesty;
Mary McAleese’s prioritising
of her family above presidential precedents.
Though hate flourished
online from both sides, and
the Yes campaign sometimes demonstrated a tendency to delegitimise the
arguments of its opponents,
the campaign was fought in
In time, I believe
people won’t even
discuss differences
in sexuality
Dónal Óg Cusack, p3
Hundreds of
thousands of people
have been set free
Ursula Halligan, p3
A moment of
liberation - not just
for gay people, but
for all of Ireland
Michael McDowell, p3
Full coverage: pages 3, 15-17, 20
Paul Bonass (left) and Luke Hoare Greene share a kiss at the Central Count Centre in Dublin Castle yesterday afternoon, as
votes continued to be counted in the referendum on same-sex marriage
PA
a largely civilised manner.
Sure, some people got carried away. But it would be
odd, after all, if the issue did
not stir deep emotions.
The result demonstrates
the rallying power of the
idea of “equality”, perhaps
the public and political priority of 21st century politics
in Ireland – partly because
there isn’t an agreed definition of what it means.
It demonstrates that there
is now a firm liberal majority on social questions in Ireland – measure this against
the 50:50 nation of 1995
when 10,000 votes separated the two sides of the argu-
ment on divorce. We live in
a changed country.
Amid the tears and cheers
yesterday, the excitement
– perhaps understandably – got to people, some
of whom were given to
declarations that this was
only the beginning of a new
movement for equality that
will transform Ireland.
It’s not. Turnout was, after
all, while huge for a referendum, significantly lower
than for a general election.
Will all those people coming
home to vote return next
year to vote for candidates
when the choices are less
clear, the questions more
complex?
And yet Friday’s vote
demonstrates the possibilities of politics when wedded
to the power of an idea. It is
a signal moment in the public life of our country. Even
the sun came out to shine.
The weight of
money swung the
referendum
Tom McGurk, p17
YOUR OPPORTUNITY IS NOW
The ultimate insider
Tom Lyons on corporate
titan Peter Sutherland
page 21
Sligo calls
for state
to cover
royal visit
costs
By Michael Brennan
Debt-laden Sligo County
Council wants state funding to cover the cost of
Prince Charles’s historic
visit last week.
The council spent
heavily on tarmacking
roads, repairing public
buildings and overtime
for council staff. However,
it is still grappling with a
budget crisis, with a deficit of €21.7 million run up
over six years.
Council chief executive Ciarán Hayes said
the final cost of the visit
was not yet known, but it
would need extra funding
to recoup its costs.
full story: page 8
Vol.28. No. 21
ESB workers to be
offered €100 million
share bailout deal
By Michael Brennan
and Fearghal
O’Connor
The government is set to sign
off on a new share bailout deal
worth up to €100 million for
ESB workers.
The ESB gave out the shares
to its workers in lieu of pay
rises back in 2001. But the
promised windfall never
came, with workers complaining they were unable to
sell their shares due to a lack
of demand.
Now the ESB has been
forced to belatedly fix the
problem, with a massive share
buyback plan for its current
and retired workers.
The secret discussions have
been taking place over recent
months with the government,
the ESB and the representative body which holds the ESB
shares for 10,800 workers.
The principles of the main
points of the proposals “have
been agreed with government
departments and ESB”, according to a letter from the ESB
Employee Share Ownership
Plan (ESOP) to its members.
ESB workers own 5 per cent
of the ESB shares through their
ESOP with the state owning
the remaining 95 per cent.
They can currently only sell
their 99 million shares to each
other through “internal markets”.
The price and volume of the
share buy back deal has not
been agreed. But at the original
€1 value of the shares, it would
cost around €100 million to
buy all of the shares owned
by current and retired ESB
workers.
However, ESB pensioners
are arguing that the shares
should be priced at €1.99,
based on the current €2 billion net asset value of ESB. At
this price, a full share buyback would cost close to €200
million.
It comes after The Sunday
Business Post revealed earlier
this month how the government exempted ESB workers
to page 2
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